


THE PATERNOSTER GANG ! in The Adventure of the Six Neapolitans

by graestu



Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, The Paternoster Gang (Big Finish Audio)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-19
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:26:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27084841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/graestu/pseuds/graestu
Summary: A singular investigation for Madame Vastra.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 2





	THE PATERNOSTER GANG ! in The Adventure of the Six Neapolitans

" _ICE CREAM VANDAL STRIKES FOR FIFTH TIME !_ "

Between the days of the Town Crier and the yet to be invented newsreader, the Victorian newspaper seller would call out the headlines to attract customers.

" _AND IN A TOTALLY UNCONNECTED STORY, THE STOLEN RARE BLUE RUBY OF MAHABALIPURAM IS STILL MISSING !_ "

It was the hottest summer anyone could remember, and in the drawing room of Number 13, Paternoster Row, Madame Vastra was telling Jenny and Strax that she intended to investigate.

"For a common or garden sapphire?" snorted Strax.

"No," argued Jenny. "It's a ruby. But blue. That's why it's so rare and priceless."

"Pah! On Sontar we have sapphires on every common and in every garden."

Madame Vastra tapped her newspaper to indicate the story she was actually interested in.

"Five blocks of Neapolitan ice cream, utterly destroyed," she summarised. "All identical, from a batch of six. In different locations, in locked rooms with no sign of anyone entering or leaving. Sadly, the papers have started calling the culprit a 'vanillan' with the nickname of Jack The Ripple. I have an appointment with the manufacturer, Signor Paolo Huppa."

"What about the stolen Rare Blue Ruby of Mahabalipuram?" asked Jenny.

"Sapphire," Strax mumbled.

"That is a totally unconnected story," said Madame Vastra, dismissing it. "Despite it being stolen from the hotel next door to Signor Huppa's factory."

A telegram arrived from Inspector Lestrade.

"I'll read that when I get back," said Madame Vastra on the way out.

Protesting, Jenny said, "I didn't think you would concern yourself with such a trifling matter."

"Ice cream is not an ingredient of trifle," Strax pointed out rather too smugly, adding, "And it's a sapphire."

"As I tell the Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard and Mr Sherlock Holmes himself," replied Signor Huppa, "I do not know where the ice creams go! No one knows where they go! That is all!"

Madame Vastra thanked him, apologised for wasting his time, and handed over her card, in case he remembered anything else, however small.

She noticed a slight flicker as something about the affair crossed his mind for the first time.

"No, it is nothing," he said.

Madame Vastra encouraged him to say.

"One of the blocks. It had a hole. Like something had been poked inside it."

He demonstrated with an angrily jabbing finger.

"What did you do?"

"I smooth it with warm knife. Nobody notice," he shrugged. "The others a bit dented too. Who knows why, in all these distractions?"

"Distractions?"

"Not one minute before, whole troop of policemen running in! Chasing bad man hiding in stock room. They shout things like, _'Stop! Thief!'_ and _'That dastardly scoundrel has just stolen the Rare Blue Ruby of Mahabalipuram!'_ "

Back home, Madame Vastra reported her findings to Jenny and Strax, who reached their own conclusions. She was about to read the telegram from Inspector Lestrade, when a frightened man burst into the room.

"You must help me, Madame Vastra!" he sobbed, thrusting a package into her hand, eager to get rid of it.

He pointed a trembling finger, and gulped, "It is the Sixth Neapolitan! They'll come after me!"

Madame Vastra unwrapped the parcel, placing it in the middle of the table in front of Jenny and Strax.

She invited the stranger to join them, and they sat staring at the ice cream.

"Jenny," said Madame Vastra after a while. "If you ever decide to publish our adventures in the manner of friend Watson, it is at this point in the story that you should include a description of how Victorians kept ice creams frozen for such long periods of time. Readers in the future will be absolutely fascinated."

"Yes, ma'am."

"And if I might say so," Strax suggested, "it is at this point in the story you should read that telegram, Madame Vastra."

"It will say that Mr Sherlock Holmes has recovered the Rare Blue Ruby of Mahabalipuram," she replied.

"In that case, ma'am," said Jenny, "why are we sitting indoors on a scorchingly hot day, staring at a - excuse the language - blinking ice cream?"

"The clue was that no one knew where they were," said Madame Vastra. "Now, you remember how I have often spoken about an alien species of silent, invisible parrots which can only be seen and heard in the first minute of their life, that have come to Earth, and lay their eggs, six at a time, in the snow?"

At that moment, from inside the block of ice cream came a chirping and cheeping.

Suddenly, ice cream was being flung in all directions, as a tiny flapping parrot erupted from its egg.

It began softly warbling a most beautifully heavenly song, and its prism-like feathers glowed in the sunlight, bouncing a kaleidoscope of every colour of the rainbow across the room like a firework display of stained glass illuminations. 

The parrot glided around as its brief angelic chorus faded away and it gradually vanished.

"You don't get this in _Sherlock Holmes_ ," said Madame Vastra.

_Unfortunately, of course, we do get this in _Sherlock Holmes _\- in the utterly ruined, unwatchably awful Jeremy Brett episodes (and so many other programmes) directed infuriatingly distractingly by Peter bloody Hammond. #still fuming about it_


End file.
